Please read through MATERIAL FOR LEADERSHIP CAN BE FOUND BELOW Part b assignment 1000 words A personal reflection on leadership Think of a time when you thought you would have liked to take on a leadership role. What qualities or styles of leadership would have been useful? How well do these fit with your understanding of yourself and your skills and qualities? NB you should write this as a personal reflection so use the first person but still ensure good academic writing is used 200 WORDS 1).What are some features of an organisations structure, culture and processes that facilitate different approaches to decision making? What are some of the factors that interfere with decision making/ It may be useful to think of an organisation in which you have worked in order to assist you in this question Lea1rning material for NO 1 • Organisational decision making A simple definition of decision making could be a cognitive process of deciding from a series of alternatives. What impacts upon a decision? • The importance of the decision • The amount of information available • The timeframe required • Who has the authority to make the decision Power is an important element in all of the above and whether those in power can follow through with the decision What factors need to be considered? • Are the management information processes effective? • Are different options identified? • What data systems are available eg child safety data bases Worker involvement in decision making There is a long-standing debate about to what extent social workers can make their own decisions in their daily work. Bureaucracy and managerialism have contributed to this argument by limiting this capacity as social work tasks are largely controlled by senior staff within organisations. How does this affect the opportunities for social workers to advocate and effect change? Read the section p111 – 113 in set text for an expansion on these issues and debates Client involvement in decision making There are a range of different ways in which clients and client groups can be involved in decisions that affect their lives and the services they receive. These can range from: low level participation such as participation in information giving or consultative forums medium level participation such as clients being involved in management committees or hiring staff maximum level participation such as clients and community members being actively involved in the control of the organisation eg advocacy organisations how do you ensure this is not tokenistic? Approaches to decision making Two main approaches to decision making • Rational approach Based on modernist and scientific or managerialism- rational logical and linear • Bounded approach Critique of rational approach based on seeing decision making as more chaotic and unpredictable Criticism focuses on rational decision making being bounded or limited by: • a lack of information (uncertainty); • the degree of complexity of the problems faced; • individuals’ limited capacity to process information; • the short time frames decisions are often made within; • conflict between different organisational goals (ambiguity). (Simon 1957) Examples of bounded decision making: • Trial and error processes: dealing with a lack of information by making small incremental decisions. • Coalitional processes: where there is a lack of clarity over goals, negotiating with and gaining support from colleagues for the decision that is to be made. • Garbage can processes: where there is a lack of information and a lack of direction, all the possible options are thrown in (the ‘garbage can’) and a random option is selected. Read pages 102 – 108 in set text And article by Munro as above link Risk and organisations Risk is the potential for a particular outcome as a result of a specific decision Risk is associated with danger However you need to consider if risk is real and measurable or is it does its significance and meaning shift depending on the content the risk has for those involved? Some contextual elements include: • the degree of control people believe they have; • whether or not it is taken on voluntarily; • how immediate the negative consequences are; • how familiar people are with the risk; • whether it and its perceived consequences are shared; • whether it is perceived as an opportunity or a threat. Risk and social work If risk is associated with danger, what are some of the factors that impact upon risk taking within HSOs? Eg Fear of malpractice suits Fear of negative media reporting? Fear of adversely affecting clients? Name some more and think about how the risk management processes are designed to prevent these under a managerial approach to organisations There a two main critical errors that can occur within risk management processes: • False positive error: where the decision maker overestimates the likelihood of negative outcomes from a decision and the result is too much protection. • False negative error: where the decision maker underestimates the likelihood of negative outcomes from a decision and harm occurs as a result. But do remember that risk taking can be associated with good leadership, creatively and new ways of viewing and approaching situations So don’t be afraid of risk taking! • Reflect Reflect Decision making What are some good decisions that you have witnessed or made yourself? What helped these to be good decisions? Similarly, for bad decisions And What are the structures systems etc. that have assisted this process of decision making? Taking risks Your own subjective experience of risk Can you think of situations where the factors identified in the content (and again below here) have impacted positively or negatively on your experience of risk? • the degree of control people believe they have; • whether or not it is taken on voluntarily; • how immediate the negative consequences are; • how familiar people are with the risk; • whether it and its perceived consequences are shared; • whether it is perceived as an opportunity or a threat. How might these factors be relevant to social work? 200 WORDS 2. Discussion board leadership and supervision Choose either: A personal reflection on leadership Think of a time when you thought you would have liked to take on a leadership role. What qualities or styles of leadership would have been useful? How well do these fit with your understanding of yourself and your skills and qualities? NB you should write this as a personal reflection so use the first person but still ensure good academic writing is used Or Supervision What are the important elements of a supervisory relationship? What particular skills are needed by an effective supervisor? Content week 8 – Leadership and Supervision Reading • Chapter 6 set text Articles • Lawler Leadership in social work: A` Case of Caveat Emptor • Beddoe Surveillance or Reflection: Professional Supervision in ‘the Risk Society’ LEADERSHIP Having moved through the content so far you may be feeling that social workers have little control over the organisational process where they work, so why would you want to enter into a leadership role. However it is clear that if we want to focus on change for the benefit of clients and colleagues then we have to participate at sometimes take a leadership role to enable change. What do leaders do: • Influence organisational processes • Enable group cohesion • Achieve organisational goals The text considers three main approaches to leadership which are those most current and important for social workers, but also considers briefly the more traditional approaches: Trait approach – focus on leadership qualities that are personal characteristics of those leading individuals Style approach – emphasis on the behaviours of individual not their personal characteristics Continency approach – focus on the context in which the leader emerges Most books on group dynamics will cover these in some detail The three more contemporary approaches: Transactional leadership The emphasis is on the exchange that occurs between the leader the other (follower) such as status or resources with the leader taking a role of advising, of directing and monitoring Transformational leadership The important element is for the leader to motivate and inspire. Charismatic leadership style Leader encourage others to do more than they thought possible Distributive leadership Sees effective leadership as not being held by one person, but that leadership roles can be taken by others at different times and in different contexts Read about these now in your text Characteristics of good leaders These lists always exhaust me – like lists of what you need to do or be to be a good social worker!! However they are at times useful So make a list for yourself now of what you think would make a good leader I will add my list into the power point for this week later SUPERVISION Supervision is an essential resource for critical reflection in professional practice It is: ‘The process that socialise practitioners into the profession’ (Egan 2012:171) Look at the how the AASW or your own professional body addresses the function and importance of supervision by going onto the appropriate web site and searching for issues relating to supervision According to Gardner (2016) there are a numbers of common themes in supervision: Normative – focusing on organisational structures and accountability Restorative – supportive enabling and encouraging Formative – developing skills and knowledge The set text looks at the elements of supervision slightly differently but basically covers the same areas Read pages 133 – 135 in set text now There can be seen to be different stages to supervisory relationships as outlined in the text on page 136 Supervision can be undertaken in groups, on a one to one or more informally as peer supervision You will find most social work and welfare text include a topic on supervision as it is such an important element of the professional life of all workers no matter how experienced they are. It also 3.What might be some stresses when an organisation begins to work with an outside organisation, stresses for the workers, the management and the clients? Learning material for week 6 The elements of good clear communication within an organisation are not far removed from those elements we use in daily personal and professional life. There are however some specific areas of communication that need to be fine-tuned for us to be effective within an organisation These include working in teams, collaboration, managing conflict, writing skills and using technology to communicate Firstly this week the material will take you through a consideration of the emotions that occur in the workplace, how to be effective in conflict management, how to use technology ethically, and how to engage with peers and others within and outside of the organisation Firstly if you read chapter 4 of the set text Hughes and Wearing you will have a good start. I will here highlight some significant issues for you to explore. Emotions and emotional intelligence • Read pages 80-85 in set text • Read article by Morrison (link below in readings) 3 sources of emotions: micro macro and mezzo covering personal, professional and group emotional responses to situations and events Emotional intelligence and its place within organisations – the reading from Morrison is good here Question Think about an agency you have recently worked in. 1. What are some of the dominant emotions that you experience (d) in this organisation? 2. How do these relate to the three tier classification above? I.e. micro, macro and mezzo? 3. What strategies do you think could be developed by the organisation to acknowledge and respond with these emotions? 4. How could the workers respond to these emotions? Dealing with conflict • Read pages 85- 90 in set text As workers we will have to engage with conflict at some points in our working life, like it or not! In order to advocate for change, conflict may be inevitable. The set text suggests a few key strategies that you will I am sure be familiar with: Negotiation Mediation Arbitration Reconciliation I suggest you try to find other sources that look at how to deal with conflict in general fashion as I don’t want to overload you here with things to read Question Think about a conflict situation you have been involved in at work What would have been the pros and cons of managing this using the different strategies outlined in the text Use of technology • Read Healy and Mullholland ‘email to twitter’ (link below and in e readings) • Read pages 90 – 92 in set text • E reading Kimball and Kim (see link below) Technology is becoming a big part of all aspects of our world and the role of social media is looming large in a lot of social work interventions Question Take time to think about how you use technology in your social work role(s) and how the organisation you work for uses this. Are there ethical issues that need to be considered? How are these managed? In what ways can social media play a positive role in social work? What are some of the challenges in using social media is social work? Team work and collaboration • Read pages 92- 101 in the set text • Read article by MacDonald and Rosier (link below) Those of you that have completed the group work unit will be familiar with a lot of the material on group dynamics in team work and I suggest you may want to have a new look at that. If you haven’t, then there are heaps of texts about how teams function. Look now at the section on team work in the set text page 95 and read about the different types of teams that are outlined there Question For each type of team answer the following: How comfortable would you be working in that kind of team? What would be the benefits to you, to the organisation and to the clients? What would be the challenges to you, the organisation and the clients? • Readings Readings 1. Chapter 4 set text Hughes and Wearing Web links and articles 1. Kim and Kendal Kimball, E. & Kim, J. Virtual boundaries: Ethical considerations for use of social media 2. Morrison Morrison, T. (2007). Emotional Intelligence, Emotion and Social Work: Context, Characteristics, Complications and Contribution. British Journal of Social Work, 37 (2): 245-263. doi: 10.1093/b 3. MacDonald, M. & Rosier, K. (2011). Interagency collaboration: Part B. Does collaboration benefit children and families? Exploring the evidence. Retrieved from https://aifs.gov.au/cfca/publications/interagency-collaboration-part-b-does-collaboration-benefi marking criteria 1. Evidence of engagement with the unit material for the relevant week 2. Academic integrity: expression, grammar and referencing